BYRAM — When he attended an open house at the Waterloo Village two years ago, John Giles wanted to learn more about the historic village. He didn’t know that a simple visit to the landmark would lead to what may be the most comprehensive written history of the village.

“I had just retired and went to the Canal Society of New Jersey Canal Day,” Giles said on Tuesday. “I picked up a brochure and realized it wasn’t quite accurate, so I offered to update the brochure.

“I kept finding things that didn’t make sense and kept digging. Then Joe Macasek, the society’s president suggested writing a book.”

After 14 months of research, Giles’ book, “The Story of Waterloo Village,” was published Tuesday by The History Press, a South Carolina-based publishing company.

“I researched for five to six hours a day, six to seven days a week,” Giles said. “It was a much bigger undertaking than I expected.”

Giles takes readers on a trip through history from when Waterloo was established as a “forge village” through the present day.

“Waterloo is one of those places that everyone knows of, but doesn’t know a lot about,” Macasek said. “There were lots of bits and pieces of history that were out there. This book puts all those pieces together.

“All the lines in the history of the Waterloo Village are now connected.”

Part of the history that Giles outlined as most interesting to him is how the property came into possession of the Smith family.

“Lemuel De Camp had purchased many parcels of land totaling approximately 900 acres between 1804 and 1816, but in 1817 the sheriff seized the land due to nonperformance of contracts,” Giles said. “Down the road, De Camp’s widow purchased back half of the interest in the land and John Smith purchased the other.

“When the canal engineers came through and Smith realized it was going to be a transportation hub, he purchased the widow’s half of the interest.”

“The link from the Smith family leasing the land to farm to John Smith finally owning the land hasn’t ever been explained before,” Giles said.

The book also includes pictures of the buildings at Waterloo today and maps of how Waterloo was configured throughout history.

Outside of learning the history of Waterloo, Giles said he hopes readers take away that the village is still open for people to visit.

“It is a state park, so people can always go and explore, but the Canal Society has Canal Days where we open the buildings and let people inside,” he said.

Macasek says anyone interested should read the book and then go tour the village to see the history they read about.

In addition to being available for purchase at Canal Days, the book is also available through Amazon.com.